Shooting Accidents

A 4-year-old Bakersfield girl has died after her brother found a gun under a pillow and accidentally shot her. Anita Armstrong was shot Monday by her 5-year-old brother, the Kern County coroner's office reported. The girl died of the wound Thursday night in Kern Medical Center. The shooting occurred while the child's mother and grandmother were sleeping in the house, according to Bakersfield police.

A 3-year-old boy was critically wounded Wednesday when a rifle he found while playing at a relative's home in the Willowbrook area accidentally discharged, authorities said. Alberto Alcala was visiting his uncle, Francisco Ayala, when he discovered the loaded .22-caliber rifle behind a crib, said Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy Roger Hom. The youngster began dragging the rifle by its barrel when the gun apparently "caught on something beneath the crib," causing it to discharge, Hom said.

Authorities credited "quick action" by a sheriff's deputy with saving the life of a 13-year-old Lancaster boy who had accidentally shot himself with his father's .45-caliber automatic pistol. A spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said the deputy, Mark Richardson, disregarded the possibility of danger when he quickly attended to the bleeding boy he encountered in the doorway of a home.